Biography from William A. Karges Fine Art - Carmel:
| J. Ottis Adams is widely recognized, along with T.C. Steele, as one of the premiere early Indiana artists influenced by the Impressionist movement. Known as a key figure in the Hoosier School, Adams was devoted to the seasonal and atmospheric moods of the Indiana Landscape.
Like Steele, Adams studied at the Royal Academy in Munich, as well as in London before returning to the U.S. Adams early works are typically genre scenes featuring a dark, Barbizon palette, very much in contrast with his brighter, softer, Impressionist works for which he’s best remembered. |
Biography from AskART:
| John Ottis Adams was best known as a nature-loving artist. A landscape painter who was a key member of the Hoosier Group of Indiana painters, Adams was, along with William Forsyth and Theodore Steele, committed to depicting his own native region. Typically their early work was peasant genre in dark tonalism, but in the 1890s, it became much lighter in the manner of the impressionists, and these artists were for many years the premier impressionist painters of the Midwest.
Much of their subject matter was along the Muscatatuck and Whitewater Rivers and around the Indiana communities of Brookville and Vernon.
Adams was born in Amitz, Indiana, and in the mid 1880s, went to Munich, Germany where he followed the regular routine of the Royal Academy. His companion there was Theodore Steele. Adams also studied with J. Frank Currier at Schleisheim, Germany and with John Parker in London. After studying in England and Germany, Adams returned to Indiana and opened an art school in Muncie, 1887.
In Indiana, the "Hoosier Group's" first significant recognition came in December, 1894 with an exhibition in Lorado Taft's studio in the Chicago Athenaeum building. An excerpt from the catalog read: "These men were isolated from their fellow artists, they were surrounded by apparently the most unpromising material, yet they set themselves to their thankless task right manfully--and this exhibition demonstrates the power of the artist's eye to find floods of color, graceful forms, and interesting compositions everywhere."
In 1896, Adams and Steele's had a two-man exhibition in Saint Louis, and in 1904, their work was in the Louisiana Purchase Exposition.
He was instrumental in the establishment of the John Herron Art Institute in 1901, and was an instructor of drawing and painting there until his retirement in 1906. He married Winifred Brady Adams in 1898. Adams divided his time among homes in Southern Indiana, Michigan, and Florida, accompanied many times by fellow artist and friend, Otto Stark.
Source:
Wilbur Peat, "Pioneer Painters of Indiana"
Peter Falk, "Who Was Who in American Art"
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Biography from AskART:
| A landscape painter who was a key member of the Hoosier Group of
Indiana painters, John Ottis Adams was, along with William Forsyth and
Theodore Steele, committed to depicting his own native region.
Typically their early work was peasant genre in dark tonalism, but in
the 1890s, it became much lighter in the manner of the impressionists,
and these artists were for many years the premier impressionist
painters of the Midwest.
Much of their subject matter was
along the Muscatatuck and Whitewater Rivers and around the Indiana
communities of Brookville and Vernon.
Adams was born in Amitz,
Indiana, and in the mid 1880s, went to Munich, Germany where he
followed the regular routine of the Royal Academy. His companion there
was Theodore Steele. Adams also studied with J. Frank Currier at
Schleisheim, Germany and with John Parker in London.
In
Indiana, the Hoosier Group's first significant recognition came in
December, 1894 with an exhibition in Lorado Taft's studio in the
Chicago Athenaeum building. An excerpt from the catalog read: "These
men were isolated from their fellow artists, they were surrounded by
apparently the most unpromising material, yet they set themselves to
their thankless task right manfully--and this exhibition demonstrates
the power of the artist's eye to find floods of color, graceful forms,
and interesting compositions everywhere."
In 1896, Adams and
Steele's had a two-man exhibition in Saint Louis, and in 1904, their
work was in the Louisiana Purchase Exposition. |
| ** If you discover credit omissions or have additional information to add, please let us know at registrar@AskART.com. |
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John Adams is also mentioned in these AskART essays:
Impressionists Pre 1940
San Francisco Panama-Pacific Exhibition 1915
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